


Beware the Smile

by theorchardofbones



Series: From Darkness to Light [2]
Category: Final Fantasy XV
Genre: Gen, Gladio getting a little jealous and protective, If You Squint - Freeform, Lost in the Woods, M/M, Slow Burn, Witchcraft
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2017-06-27
Updated: 2017-06-27
Packaged: 2018-11-14 01:39:02
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,988
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/11197761
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/theorchardofbones/pseuds/theorchardofbones
Summary: Gladiolus challenges Prompto to a little friendly competition; things go wrong in a rather unexpected way.Written forPromptio Weekday 2, under the prompt 'exploration'.





	Beware the Smile

**Author's Note:**

> You can follow Prompto and Gladio's story [here](http://archiveofourown.org/series/756873).
> 
> If anybody's interested, my personal tumblr is [here](https://theorchardofbones.tumblr.com), and my ffxv blog is [here](flowercrownsandchocobos.tumblr.com).

Prompto is up early, for once. Gladiolus watches under an arm thrown across his face as his companion slips through the tent’s opening and steps out into the dawn, stretching his arms over his head.

He doesn’t hear Gladiolus approach behind him, doesn’t hear the soft crunch of footsteps on the solid ground of the haven. He’s looking to the east, to where the sun will soon rise, his hands resting on top of his head.

He flinches when Gladiolus claps a hand down on his shoulder; fortunately for them both, and for the others still sleeping in the tent, he doesn’t shout out.

‘You gotta be more aware of your surroundings,’ Gladiolus says, as Prompto twirls on the soles of his feet to face him. ‘Never know what could be lurking in the shadows, waiting to attack.’

Prompto rolls his eyes.

‘We’re in a haven, Gladio. Only thing lurking around here is _you_.’

Gladiolus is just reaching up to ruffle a hand through Prompto’s blond hair when he catches himself, letting his hand drop. He’s been doing that a lot lately — letting his guard slip.

Prompto’s enthusiasm is so infectious it’s easy to get swept up in it, to forget that they don’t know each other all that well. Before the road trip, they barely shared more than a handful of words with one another in passing whenever they ran into each other at Noct’s apartment.

‘Since you’re awake so early,’ Gladiolus says, ‘how ‘bout a run to start off the day?’

He expects Prompto to protest, to throw a tantrum, but he gives a shrug instead and looks about their surroundings. He points off to the east, where the plains run flat and smooth, perfect for traversal by foot.

‘Thattaway?’

They warm up first, stretching by the edge of the haven. Gladiolus leaves a note for the others — _Gone for a while. Don’t leave without us._ — and they set off, keeping pace easily with one another.

It’s a little chilly out, the sun yet to have spread its warmth across the land, but Gladiolus doesn’t feel it. Before long they’ve worked up a sweat and he can see Prompto swipe the back of his arm across his forehead, his skin beaded with moisture.

‘Didn’t figure you for the running type,’ Gladiolus remarks, glancing over.

Prompto shrugs.

‘I didn’t get this physique overnight, y’know.’

Gladiolus can see him getting cocky — this pace is little by way of exertion. Maybe they ought to make it a real competition…

He points off to the left, toward the treeline in the distance. It’s an uphill hike across the face of a slope from where they currently run.

‘Race you?’ he says. ‘First one to the trees does the other’s chores tomorrow.’

Prompto looks over at him with narrowed eyes. Gladiolus sees him flick a glance toward the trees, then back again, and before Gladiolus can react he takes off at a sprint toward the forest.

‘Damnit,’ Gladiolus mutters, setting off after him.

It figures that somebody so small would be so fast — where Gladiolus had always thought of him as scrawny, he powers up the incline as though it’s nothing at all. Gladiolus’s strides are longer, though, and he soon makes quick work of the distance between them.

He’s caught up enough now that he can hear the sound of Prompto’s breathing, heavy and laboured; Prompto shoots a look back over his shoulder and pushes himself that much harder when he realises how close the race is.

Prompto makes the treeline first, by a hair’s breadth, but he’s so busy twisting back to gloat that he hits a root and stumbles over it, flying forward into the forest.

Just like that, he’s gone: tumbling over and over, vanishing out of sight.

Gladiolus slows his pace to a jog, then stops. Other than the noises of the birds in the tree canopy, disturbed by the human intrusion, he can’t hear anything.

‘Prompto?’

The response is muffled, tiny and meek: ‘I’m okay.’

Gladiolus trots up to the edge and peers down over it. The trees conceal the lip of some sort of basin, bounded as far as he can see by a sheer drop; when he finally spots Prompto, lying on his back almost hidden by the greenery, he’s a long way down.

‘Did you hurt anything?’ Gladiolus asks. ‘It’s a pretty big drop.’

Prompto sits up wearily. When he tries to push himself up to stand he gives a little yelp of pain and sits back down with a thud.

‘It’s my wrist,’ he calls. ‘I think I twisted it.’

Gladiolus sighs and covers his face with his hands. Prompto’s not going to be climbing back up any time soon, not with a sprained wrist.

‘Okay,’ he answers, dropping his hands. ‘Gimme a sec and I’ll find a way down.’

It’s slow work — slower than Prompto’s more abrupt method, anyway. Gladiolus manages to find handholds in the roots and vines sprouting from the face of the drop.

Prompto’s still parked on his backside when Gladiolus makes his way over. He looks worse off than he had at a distance: there are cuts and scrapes all over him wherever there’s bare skin, and there’s a tear in the knee of his jeans, gleaming wetly with something Gladiolus suspects might be blood. His hair is filled with little twigs and leaves and bits of dirt, but his head seems uninjured. That’s something, at least.

‘C’mon,’ he says, reaching for Prompto’s good hand.

Together they get Prompto to his feet, although he seems unsteady where he stands. When he glances down at himself to inspect the worst of the damage, he spots the gash in his pants and huffs out a sigh.

‘Aw, man.’

‘Count yourself lucky if that’s the worst you got to complain about,’ Gladiolus retorts.

They give the climb a glance over but Prompto only echoes Gladiolus’s earlier assumption: he’s not going to be able to make it up. Gladiolus is just considering the logistics of making his way back up with somebody thrown over his shoulder when Prompto’s voice rings out from a little way off.

He’s wandering, deeper into the forest. Gladiolus sees him point at something — the trees, _no_ , beyond the trees. It isn’t until he catches up to Prompto, stepping quickly but carefully through the undergrowth, that he sees what Prompto is pointing at.

There’s a clearing, probably not much larger in diameter than the length of the Regalia. In the centre of it is a figure hewn in stone.

‘Let’s go check it out,’ Prompto says. He takes off before Gladiolus can stop him.

The statue is a woman, arms raised toward the heavens. Her body is lithe, so expertly carved it’s almost as if she were a real, living human who was turned to stone. Some sort of serpent wraps itself around her, its finned head turned skyward.

‘Leviathan,’ Prompto says, breathless.

Whatever this little shrine is doing here, hidden away within the woods, Gladiolus knows at the very least that somebody still tends to it — there’s a bowl carved into the plinth, filled with clear water, and offerings of flowers, food and money have been left all around it.

‘Somebody still worships here,’ Prompto says.

He walks toward it, hesitantly stretching a hand out toward the carved serpent. It’s so lifelike Gladiolus almost expects it to spring out and attack.

‘Then there’s gotta be a way out of here,’ Gladiolus says.

He drags his eyes from the shrine and looks around it, searching for any other hints of human life. There’s a path through the trees, small but well-worn; wherever it leads, it’s sure to take them toward civilisation.

He whips his phone out to send the others a text to let them know the situation, but the spot on the screen where the signal bars usually show up is filled instead with a little X.

‘Damnit.’

‘What’s up?’

Prompto steps across the clearance towards him, peering at the phone in his hand. Gladiolus shakes his head and kills the screen, pocketing it.

‘Nothing,’ he says. ‘No signal. I hope the others don’t come looking for us.’

The path leads in a mostly straight line, veering every now and then around trees or boulders. They aren’t on it long before Gladiolus realises it’s taking them away from the treeline, deeper into the woods.

Prompto doesn’t seem concerned when he voices his worries.

‘Path means people, right?’ he says. ‘We just gotta follow the yellow brick road.’

It’s so thickly wooded here, the tree cover so dense, that it starts to feel like night as they plunge deeper into the trail. Gladiolus thinks he hears the sinister noises of a daemon lurking somewhere nearby, but he convinces himself that it’s just his imagination. Still, he can’t help looking back over his shoulder from time to time, his eyes scanning for the movement of anything larger and deadlier than a deer.

When it feels as though they’ve been wandering for hours — and just as Gladiolus is about to resign himself to the fact that they’re lost — the path begins to widen before opening out onto another clearing. This one is larger than the first, with a cottage built right in the middle. The sight of the sunlight, of the blue skies overhead, gives him more relief than he could admit.

‘Somebody actually _lives_ here?’ Prompto says, peering around. ‘Must get spooky at night with the daemons prowling around.’

‘The daemons aren’t welcome here and they know it.’

Gladiolus’s head whips toward the sound of the stranger’s voice; a woman stands by the door of the cottage. He’s almost sure she wasn’t there a moment ago, but he shakes the thought off and steps forward.

‘Sorry to intrude on your land,’ he says. ‘We’re lost.’

The woman shakes her head, sending her long brown curls cascading about her shoulders. Gladiolus can’t quite place her age: her face is youthful and unlined, but she carries herself with the refinement of someone much older.

‘These lands belong to me no more than they do to you,’ she says. ‘If you are lost, however, I may be of some help. Where did you come from?’

Gladiolus points back in the direction they came; he’s not even sure of how far they’ve strayed.

‘We were camped out at the haven nearby,’ he explains. ‘My friend’s hurt. We followed the path here — figured we might find somebody who could show us the way out.’

The woman looks him over appraisingly, then does the same to Prompto. When her eyes land on his hand, she strides over and gently reaches out to take it. He lets her.

‘It’s not broken,’ she says, giving it a cursory glance. ‘It will heal.’

She turns her glance toward Gladiolus once more. Still holding Prompto’s hand in one of hers, she gestures with the other toward her home.

‘I can show you the way back to the haven,’ she says, ‘but you must be thirsty. Come inside, and I’ll make you some tea.’

Something niggles at Gladiolus, a tug at the back of his mind. Whatever it is, it’s gone in an instant.

‘Sure.’

The woman smiles — a pretty smile, warm and welcoming. Prompto lets her take him by the hand and lead him to the cottage, and Gladiolus follows close behind.

* * *

The interior of the cottage is small and cosy, lit dimly by candles and oil lamps. As far as Gladiolus can tell it’s just one room; a small kitchen area sits off in a corner, while there’s a bed in another. The place is so warm it makes him feel drowsy.

‘Please,’ she says, gesturing toward a table to one side of the room. ‘Take a seat.’

She lets Prompto go with a pat on the hand and a sweet smile. Something about it makes Gladiolus feel jealous: protective.

They sit beside each other at the little table carved out of raw wood while she potters about in the kitchen, filling a cast iron kettle with water from a jug. She moves to the fireplace and hangs it over the flames before turning back to Gladiolus and Prompto.

‘You were at the haven,’ she says. ‘Are you hunters?’

Gladiolus feels like a schoolboy under scrutiny from a teacher. Beside him, Prompto hurriedly shakes his head.

‘We’re on a road trip,’ he answers. ‘We’re bringing Prin—’

Gladiolus gives his leg a thump under the table before he can continue; Prompto wails and shoots an irritated look at him, but thankfully he doesn’t finish what he had been saying.

‘A road trip?’ the woman echoes. ‘How lovely. Just the two of you?’

‘No,’ Gladiolus says. ‘There’s two others.’

Maybe it’s Gladiolus’s imagination — maybe it’s the heat, or the smell of herbs all around, or the little voice somewhere in the back of his thoughts, tuned out like a radio filled with static — but he can’t help thinking the woman’s shoulders dip a little. She briskly turns away, toward the kettle over the fire.

Gladiolus uses the time to look about the place, to try to get a read on things. This stranger, kind enough to invite two men into her home, seems harmless enough. So why does he feel like somebody’s walking over his grave?

He feels as though he nods off; a moment later the kettle is whistling in the fireplace and the woman bustles about, readying their tea. The smell of whatever brew she uses is intoxicating as the steam wafts through the room. Gladiolus resolves himself not to have any.

‘The others,’ she says, as she sets two cups down in front of them, filled to the brim. ‘Your friends. They aren’t lost, like you?’

She seems awfully interested in the others. The hairs prickle on Gladiolus’s arms, and before Prompto can take a sip of tea, he reaches out and grips him by the hand.

‘We really should get going,’ he says.

The woman nods. She takes a step back, folding her hands in front of her.

‘Of course.’

She bustles away a moment later; Gladiolus sees her root through a stack of books and papers until she finds a blank page and begins scribbling on it with a pen. When she returns to the table she sets it down in front of Gladiolus and he finds she’s drawn a map.

‘That’s the shrine you no doubt stumbled upon,’ she says, using a long, slender finger to point it out. ‘Here is the edge of the forest. The verge surrounding the basin is very sheer all along, almost impassable, unless you follow the stream.’

According to the map, the stream runs not too far from the cottage, leading in a mostly direct path in the direction they need to go.

‘Convenient,’ he mutters.

The woman smiles.

‘Are you sure you won’t have your tea?’

‘We’re sure,’ Gladiolus says. 

She shows them to the door, opening it ahead of them. Gladiolus files out, but before Prompto can go she gently takes his hand. Gladiolus thinks it’s the one with the injured wrist, but he doesn’t react as though it hurts.

‘My boy,’ she says, looking Prompto in the eye. ‘I see a darkness around you — from within or without, I can’t be sure. I see a man. Tall, dark and…’

She pauses, flicking her glance toward Gladiolus.

‘Trust,’ she says. ‘In yourselves, and each other. You’ll need it in the times to come.’

With these words ringing in their ears, she ushers them out of the cottage, closing the door behind them with a firm click.

They stand in silence in the clearing, blinking against the brightness of the daylight.

‘That was…’ Prompto murmurs, trailing off.

Gladiolus shakes his head.

‘That was a heap of crap.’

Silence dogs them as they follow the woman’s hand-drawn map, skirting the edge of the stream. In hardly any time at all they see a broad, flat horizon out beyond the trees; Gladiolus unconsciously picks up his pace, eager to be away from this unsettling place.

His phone sounds out when they emerge from the forest: it’s a notification of a text message from Noct, probably sent while they had no signal.

_Where R U? U missed breakfast_

Gladiolus stops in his tracks. He feels a laugh bubble out of his chest; something about the text is so mundane — so normal — that he could cry. Prompto turns and looks at him, an eyebrow raised.

‘Everything… okay?’

‘Yeah,’ Gladiolus says. ‘Everything’s perfect.’

* * *

They’re in the Regalia later on when the sun begins to set and Ignis starts talking about finding a place to stay for the night. For once, Gladiolus doesn’t mind when Noctis suggests they check into a nearby motel.

Ignis takes the next exit, leading them toward the welcoming lights of the settlement by the side of the road.

Gladiolus waits until the others have gone ahead before he catches up to Prompto, gently laying a hand on his shoulder.

‘How’s your wrist?’ he says.

Prompto looks blankly at him for a moment before turning his glance down toward his hand. He gives a little shrug.

‘Fine,’ he says. ‘I guess. Haven’t really thought about it.’

‘So that woman earlier, huh,’ Gladiolus says. ‘I was thinkin’ we never even got her name.’

Prompto nods, thoughtfully. He lifts his hand, using it to flatten a strand of hair.

‘Whole thing kinda feels like a dream,’ he replies. ‘And that stuff at the end? About… the darkness?’

At this, Gladiolus can’t help but laugh: a big, rumbling chuckle that makes Prompto flinch.

‘What, you took her seriously?’ he says. He rolls his eyes. ‘She’s probably lost it from living all alone in the woods.’

‘Maybe,’ Prompto murmurs.

Gladiolus can tell Prompto isn’t very convinced. He gives a weary sigh and prods Prompto forwards, in the direction of the motel.

‘C’mon,’ he says. ‘Before they have dinner without us, too.’


End file.
